The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty YearsHarper, Ida Husted
History
The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years
Harper, Ida Husted
Anthony, Susan B. (Susan Brownell), 1820-1906
After considerable uproar these were referred to a select committee on
which were placed two ladies, Mary L. Booth and Julia A. Wilbur, both
strong supporters of Miss Anthony. The committee brought in a majority
report in favor of the resolutions but this make-shift minority report
was adopted: "In our opinion the colored children of the State should
enjoy equal advantages of education with the white." Miss Anthony then
proceeded to throw another bomb by presenting this resolution:
Since the true and harmonious development of the race demands that
the sexes be associated together in every department of life;
therefore
_Resolved_, That it is the duty of all our schools, colleges and
universities to open their doors to woman and to give her equal and
identical educational advantages side by side with her brother man.
This opened the flood gates. Motions to lay on the table, to refer to a
committee, etc., were voted down. A few strong speeches were made in
favor, but most of them were in opposition and very bitter, insisting
that "it was sought to uproot the theory and practice of the whole
world." The antique Professor Davies was in his element. He declared:
"Here is an attempt to introduce a vast social evil. I have been trying
for four years,[_i.e._ ever since Miss Anthony's first appearance at a
teachers' convention] to escape this question, but if it has to come,
let it be boldly met and disposed of. I am opposed to anything that has
a tendency to impair the sensitive delicacy and purity of the female
character or to remove the restraints of life. These resolutions are
the first step in the school which seeks to abolish marriage, and
behind this picture I see a monster of social deformity."
Another speaker, whose name is lost in oblivion, said in tones which
would melt a heart of stone: "Shall an oak and a rose tree receive the
same culture? Better to us is the clear, steady, softened, silvery
moonlight of woman's quiet, unobtrusive influence, than the flashes of
electricity showing that the true balance of nature is destroyed. Aye,
better a thousand times is it than the glimmering ignus fatuus rising
from decayed hopes and leading the deluded follower to those horrible
quagmires of social existence--amalgamation and Mormonism."
Prof. John W. Buckley, of Brooklyn, opposed the resolution in coarse
and abusive language. State Superintendent of Public Instruction Henry
H. Van Dyck demolished its last hope when he demanded with outstretched
arm and pointed finger: "Do you mean to say you want the boys and girls
to room side by side in dormitories? To educate them together can have
but one result!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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